Business Blogging - Small & Large

I had an e-mail from Christina Friedken at Booth & Associates, a PR firm representing OPEN from American Express reporting on the Semi-Annual Small Business Monitor.  The report detailed the status of small business operations in many areas including the use of blogs.  With respect to blogs, they had some interesting findings "Only 13% of owners/managers read Blogs relating to their business and less than one in ten maintain Blogs for their business (7%). Among those who do maintain Blogs – the majority say they Blog daily (51%).  The survey was conducted among 625 small business owners/managers of companies with fewer than 100 employees by International Communications Research from September 12 - 27, 2006.  The poll has a margin of error of +3.9%."

Here were some other breakdowns of the research results by gender and geographical location: 

WOMEN
Only 14% of women owners/managers read blogs relating to their business and less than one in ten maintain Blogs for their business (9%). Among those who do maintain blogs - the majority say they blog daily (51%).The study did not ask questions related to why blogging was so low in the small business segment, so any reasons to explain it would be speculation on my part.  However, I suspect that the results show a lack of time, lack of knowledge about blogs or some other negative perspectives on how blogs fit in their overall mix.

MEN
Only 13% of owners/managers read blogs relating to their business and less than one in ten maintain Blogs for their business (5%). Among those who do maintain blogs - the majority say they blog daily (52%).

NORTH EAST
Only 11% of owners/managers read blogs relating to their business and one in ten maintain blogs for their business (11%). Among those who do maintain blogs - nearly half say they blog daily (46%).

NORTH CENTRAL
Only 12% of owners/managers read blogs relating to their business and less than one in ten maintain blogs for their business (7%). Among those who do maintain blogs - nearly half say they blog daily (48%).

SOUTH
Only 15% of owners/managers read blogs relating to their business and less than one in ten maintain blogs for their business (9%). Among those who do maintain blogs - the majority say they blog daily (56%).

WEST
Only 15% of owners/managers read blogs relating to their business and less than one in ten maintain blogs for their business (4%). Among those who do maintain blogs - the majority say they blog daily (51%).

Ted Demopoulos at Blogging for Business has a good post describing why small business should blog as a matter of their standard marketing practices to increase web findability. 

Meanwhile Information Week reported that it isn't only small businesses that aren't getting it about blogs with SocialText's Fortune 500 Wiki having identified only 40 or 8% of the top 500 businesses blogging.

Given my experience with blogs, macro trends reported in the industry and increasing use of blogs by businesses of all sizes, I would think that the numbers should be going up. 

AD
If you're a small business looking for some help with your blog strategy you can e-mail me or give me a call at 608 255 4092. I'd be happy to talk with you about your marketing objectives and explore whether blogs would work for you or not.